Anoka County promotes Pedal Power Over Horse Power For National Bike To Work Week

Anoka County promotes Pedal Power Over Horse Power For National Bike To Work Week

Biking for exercise or fun is a popular past-time in the Twin Cities.

Biking to work isn’t quite as popular – but Anoka County wants that to change, so there will be less cars and trucks on the roads.

Because most North Metro residents use personal vehicles to get to their jobs, there is a local and national push to get people to think of other options – including bicycles.

“For about 12 years we’ve been doing bike to work week,” said Laurie Eggers, a Commute Solutions Specialist for Anoka County. “That has become a fun event and it’s a national event that is happening May 12th through 16th. Commute solutions is a transportation management organization (TMO) and about 20 years ago Anoka County started that up to reduce traffic congestion and improve air quality.”

Simply put, Anoka County wants to see less solo drivers on the highway and has suggestions on how to do that.

“Carpooling,” Eggers said. “Busing. Biking.”

The county is hoping some people take this cue and find alternative ways to their job.

“We have research that shows 76 percent of the traffic on the road are single occupancy vehicles,” Eggers said.

Anoka County is encouraging residents to sign up for national bike to work week so they can enjoy the benefits of fitness and also do their part to lessen gridlock.

“Getting a workout in,” Eggers said. “Less gas. You have time to reflect and you’re missing some of the traffic.”

Perks for participants

The county even has some perks for anyone who participates.

“We offer a nice backpack with some bike gear in there,” Eggers said. “Some t-shirts. We try to make it as simple as possible for employers to do this.”

Bike to work week has been going on for a dozen years. The number of cyclists started to shrink when COVID hit, but things are slowly trending up.

“It’s been down and I feel like we’re on a rebound right now,” Eggers said. “We have about 200 people signed up. We could go up to 400.”

For some North Metro residents, bike to work week is just an extension of their daily cycling routine.

“It seems like the younger generations are way excited about this type of thing and some of them don’t even purchase cars,” Eggers said. “They just find ways to get around. I will add that buses have bike racks on them so you can bike to the bus and take your bike into work…There’s some people that get so excited about this they’re doing it year-round even in the snow – they get the fat tire bikes. There’s somebody that works at the city of Fridley who comes in from Champlin every day, it doesn’t matter the weather.”

The county knows it’s more likely for someone to bike to work when they’re within a close radius to their job.

“Realistically 5 to 10 miles,” Eggers said. “We have some that are going further but I believe that they have a little more experience biking.”

Another benefit of pedal power versus horse-power is cost.

“Owning a car and commuting is about $10,000 a year,” Eggers said.

Registration for bike to work week runs through May 2. For more information email Laurie Eggers at Laurie.Eggers@Anoka CountyMN.gov.

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SOURCE: NORTH METRO TV